Olivia put her hand over mine on the handle of my cart. Her sympathy seeped into my hand, and to my surprise, it felt genuine. That was new. The last time we spoke, Olivia had wanted to burn me at the stake. Or on a cross. Then again, that was right after she’d found out I was a witch.
She squeezed my hand. “Sam told me about your husband. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
She’d said all this with less sincerity last year at the funeral. I ducked my head and gave the rote answer, the same one I’d given any time I went out in public and ran into someone who knew me before my world fell apart. “Thank you. It’s been incredibly difficult.”
“I can’t imagine losing my Sam. But it’s been five years now, hasn’t it?” She raised her eyebrows. “Are you about ready to start playing the field again?”
The smile on my face froze. I extracted my hand from under hers and straightened my spine. “I’m here to sell the old homeplace and then get back to Philly. That’s all.”
Olivia’s face fell again. “Oh, I hate that you’re going to sell that beautiful old house. How long has it been in your family?”
And why were we having this conversation? Oh, right because Olivia was a busybody. Good to know some things never changed. Yay, me. Not.
“I was just trying to figure that out in my head. When I find the records, I’ll let you know.” I winked at her and pushed my cart forward a few feet, but she didn’t get the hint. So help me, if she didn’t leave, I wouldn't be held responsible for my actions. How mad would Sam be if I turned his wife into a squirrel? I’m sure it would be worth the risk. Maybe. I shelved the thought for later. I didn’t want to do it in front of Little Sammie, anyway.
“Well, I insist you come to have dinner with Sam and me very soon!”
I kept going. “That sounds lovely, you can have Sam call me about it.” I intentionally didn’t invite Olivia to give me a call. I wasn’t here to make friends. And I sure didn’t trust Olivia. “I’ve got to run now!”
After seeing Olivia and having to talk about Clay, I wanted to get the hell out of there. I had been feeling like I was ready to think about life after being widowed, but that wasn’t at all something I wanted to discuss with Olivia Lockhart or anyone else from my childhood life in Shipton Harbor.
I sped around the store after that, snatching up anything I could quickly think of that I’d need for the next twenty-four hours or so. If I didn’t remember it now, I’d figure out how to live without it.
The drive to the house took a good fifteen minutes. Shipton Harbor was a small town, but the house wasn’t in the town. It was on a cliff overlooking the ocean on the outer edges of the city limits.
At the moment, that ocean was calm with medium-ish waves breaking. The scent of saltwater, sand, and sunshine swirled around me, welcoming me home. It was the only thing I missed about Shipton Harbor. Well, that and Winnie.
Maybe Sam.
Definitely not Olivia.
And this beautiful, old, gothic Victorian that stood tall against the blue sky with puffy white clouds. With the lights off—not because the electricity was cut off, but because no one was there—it looked sad and, well, dark. I stood beside my car and stared at the home I grew up in. So many emotions churned inside me. A voice from deep inside my mind said to keep the old place, start a new life.
But I wasn't sure I wanted to start over. I was forty-three for crying out loud. Where would I even begin?
Bracing myself, I grabbed my grocery bags and fished the house key out of my pocket. This was the big moment to find out how bad the house was inside. The electricity had been off for the last year, since right after Aunt Winnie’s funeral. I only had it and the water turned back on a few days ago, so at least I would have that. Probably.
My phone jingled my son’s text tone in my pocket. My baby was keeping tabs on me. I couldn’t help but smile. He was the one who came with me to Shipton Harbor and cleaned out the house last year. The perishables, anyway. It had been hard on both of us, him helping me in place of his father. But he’d risen to the occasion. Wallie was a great kid. Now that he was settled in at college, I had no reason not to take care of this and get the house sold.
I’d been putting it off for too long, dreading the flood of emotions I was sure would overwhelm me at any moment.
On the other hand, those emotions could’ve been waiting to catch me off guard. Hit me when I wasn’t expecting them. I needed to keep an eye on them. Keep them locked down tight.
The door creaked as if it was making the only sound the house had heard since the last time I closed it. Or was it a sad kind of greeting? Or a cry for help? I couldn’t tell.
I suppressed a shiver as I entered the open first floor. Everything was exactly as I’d left it. Furniture covered in sheets, boards on the windows, the whole shebang. The air was stale and smelled of dust, old magic, and salt.
Hurrying to the kitchen, I put the grocery bags on the dusty white drape-covered kitchen table and flicked on the light. To my relief, it came on. It would be dark in a few short hours, and the last thing I wanted was no power. And that saved me a phone call to the electric company. They were lucky.
I opened the fridge and sniffed, then groaned while covering my nose. I’d scrubbed it before leaving it to be turned off, but it had still developed a smell. It was at least still clean. I just had to get rid of the smell. I didn’t have any herbs to mix up a spell, but I had picked up some baking soda while at the store. Thank the goddess for small things.
Unpacking my bags, I opened one of the boxes of baking soda and put it in the back corner to start absorbing the smells. The freezer was next. I slid the second box in and remembered I forgot to buy a bag of ice. This old fridge didn’t have an icemaker, so I was SOL for my Diet Cola for a while.
And on that thought, I realized I might have to replace it to put the house on the market. I’d know for sure when the realtor came by. For now, I’d get the place ready for visitors.
Grabbing a towel out of the cabinet where they’d been all my life, I smelled it. It still had a faint scent of the homemade detergent Auntie used. She’d scented it with dried roses. Smiling, I dampened it and wiped out the cabinet my Yaya and Aunt Winnie had always used for dry goods, then put away the rest of the food.
With the kitchen settled, for the time being, I walked around the house before I went out to the car to unload the bags I’d brought with me.
Ah, but first, the boards needed to go. Drawing on my witchy side and not the other part of me that I refused to use, I used the magic to remove the boards from the windows. The bright afternoon sun streamed in, lighting up each room so there was no need to turn the lights on as I went. The home was built with large windows in each room. I walked out of the kitchen toward the back porch and was surprised when a sense of dismay washed over me. Auntie had always kept an herb garden out here. It’d once been full of life and beautiful.
Someone well in the past had converted the original porch of the house into a sunroom, then added another porch on the back of that at some point. Both the sunroom and the porch had been filled with a variety of herbs and flowers during Aunt Winnie’s life.
Seeing it without all the little pots of greenery only drove home that I’d never see my Aunt Winnie again. She’d raised me, along with my grandmother, Yaya, and filled the hole that would’ve been there from losing my parents at such a young age.